April 17, 2009
Traveling through air can be damaging to our ears. Air travel can produce rapid changed in air pressure, especially during descent that can seriously damage our ears. Our Eustachian tubes that is connected to our throat and middle ear helps to stabilize the pressure in our ears. However, if the Eustachian tubes don’t open enough, our ears may feel block and can probably cause damage to our ears.
To prevent the ear blockage during flight here are some practical tips:
- Chew Gums. Chewing stimulates saliva flow, which cause us to swallow often. Swallowing helps to open our Eustachian tubes thus prevents the ear blockage. For babies and toddlers have them such on a bottle or pacifier.
- Yawn. Yawning also helps to open our Eustachian tubes.
- Pinch your nose. Pinch your nostril shut, take a mouthful of air and gently force the air into your nose as if you are trying to blow open your nostrils. Or you may pinch you nostrils shut and swallow.
- Use a decongestant nasal spray. Use the spray 30 minutes to an hour before the descent of aircraft. Nasal spray shrinks the membranes lining in our Eustachian tubes so the tubes won’t close as easily. A decongestant spray also helps to open blocked ears, although it is not advisable to be often.
- Don’t sleep when landing. This is for the obvious reason that you may not swallow enough to keep your Eustachian tube open when you are asleep.var infolink_pid = 19182;
